Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Women can make false rape complaints, which can be defeated in a District Court , however the mud sticks in the family court, as insidious protection orders remain firmly in place .The Family Court enjoys lies and false allegations ( ask the 40 plus lawyers & psycho nutbars in my case )!! Mum then allows the girls to be sexually active as 12 year olds with her many new boyfriends and dad cannot do a thing . Go figure as I don't understand why or how this can happen in this cess -pit country .The law does not protect the vulnerable and it is so dysfunctional it is dangerous for many children . I cannot fathom that a government and judicial system would not listen to a concerned father for six years . His worse concerns are his present nightmare as police investigate the widespread child abuse . Why did they not listen to me in 2001 ?

The Principal Family Court Judge refused to let his judges be interviewed for a Government-commissioned report on protection orders because he believed its authors were biased.

The Waikato University report, commissioned by the Ministry of Women's Affairs, lambasted the judiciary for failing victims of domestic violence and tacitly colluding with "batterers' interests".

Principal Family Court Judge Peter Boshier said he knew the views and track record of the lead authors, Ruth Busch and Neville Robertson, so declined to let his judges participate.

"I had no doubt at all when the research was embarked on that it would not be research," he said.

"I knew it would be a personal restatement of the authors' positions.

"I feared we would end up with what we got – the personal recollections far outweigh the research.

"I did not see why we should be part of a study and project that would not have integrity and I've been proved correct."

However, Robertson, a senior psychology lecturer, defended their work and accused Boshier of being precious.

"The trouble is judges think they're beyond criticism," he said.

"But we give them a lot of power and responsibility which they need to use to protect the vulnerable.

"If they don't then they need to be held to account."

Boshier said Busch, an associate law professor, showed her bias with facetious remarks about judges considering without-notice protection orders in their tea breaks.

"Another take on that is that we guarantee we will do protection orders every day even when we're dealing with other cases.

"How we do that is by using our tea breaks so when researchers are having their tea breaks, judges are using theirs to work ... Family Court judges are so committed we're prepared to use our own time."

Boshier said the facts in the study did not bear out the conclusions the authors drew.

The report was particularly critical of a failure to issue more without-notice protection orders.

Last year, the Family Court granted 78.4 per cent of the 3848 applications for without-notice protection orders.

In the Waikato University study, 32 of the 43 women interviewed for case studies applied for without-notice orders, with 28 granted.

"That's even a higher proportion than the national statistics from the Ministry of Justice so where is the balance in them suggesting we get it so wrong," he said.

"I'm cross and annoyed that a publicly funded report is so sub-standard."

Robertson said the judge's figures were correct but their argument was most orders should be granted and those that were not should have reasons listed so the applicants could appeal.

"Battered women are expected to accept what a judge rules without reasons. No other group in society would accept that," Robertson said.

Boshier said the court had to be seen to be fair and could not bow to pressure groups on either side of the debate.

"The public have to have confidence the Family Court is a court which makes just decisions.

"We can't be harangued and harassed by pressure groups on either side."

Boshier said while he found the bias and personal comments in the report distasteful, many of the 46 recommendations had merit and the Ministry of Justice was acting on them.

"We can do better, there's no question of that but to say we're getting it wrong and never getting it right is frustrating and mischievous."

"The number of young people participating in more than three FGCs a year has more than doubled since 2002.

"Figures I've obtained through parliamentary questions show that 406 young people had more than three FCGs in 2001/02, and that figure has skyrocketed to 839 in 2006/07.

"These figures are very disturbing and show that the youth justice system is completely failing young people.

"One of the reasons that young people are going from one FGC to another is that assessment reports haven't been prepared in time.

"Why do our young people have to suffer because of bureaucratic mismanagement?"

Mrs Tolley says 90 young people had five FGCs last year, 11 youths had to go through the process seven times, and two young people went to 10 FGCs.

"It's time the Labour Government began taking youth justice seriously and stopped treating it like the forgotten relative of CYF.

"Labour needs to quit the talk and instead, come up with a system which ensures young people are a priority in youth justice. Young offenders need action from this government, not just talk."

Ends

August 28, 2007 at 12:13 AM CommentsMy alienated daughter was involved with FGC and Youth Court and as the biological father I was not told . Now I doubt whether the damage is ever going to be repairable . I am livid with the bias and gender prejudice justice system ! This is a sad indictment, however else would I expect as it is a mandate for the feminazi labour government to create widespread fatherlessness for society !!

Sunday, August 26, 2007

The day before the murder of Rhys Jones, Matt O'Connor - founder of the Fathers 4 Justice group - was warning me about what happens to a society where fathers are ejected from the lives of their children. His was an apocalyptic vision of social breakdown: family life in decline, violence on the rise. "Young men are growing up with no proper male role models. Gangs become their fathers. Seventeen children have been murdered this year," O'Connor declared. And then Rhys Jones made it 18.

O'Connor and his merry band of caped crusaders - they are famous for dressing up as Spiderman and Batman - divide public opinion. Some see them as brave, bold champions of the rights of dads. Other regard them as a bunch of angry, sad, sexist blokes in tights seeking attention.

"I would not be doing my f****** job if I wasn't getting attention for the cause," says O'Connor in his defence.

Over the past five years O'Connor has sent protesters up onto the ledge of Buckingham Palace, the walls of York Minster and the tops of Stonehenge. In 2004 he arranged for Tony Blair to be flour-bombed during prime minister's questions. Then, 10 days ago, two F4J members were arrested after scaling the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC. They unfurled a banner reading: "For the fathers of the nation: Fathers 4 Justice has arrived".

Listening to O'Connor, 40, talk about plans for "breaking America", he sounds like a pop manager launching a new band. In fact, with his tinted hair, hip T-shirt and designer glasses, he looks like a rock manager and he swears like an East Ender with Tourette's.

So how did a man who worked in the City designing restaurants end up as crusader for dad's rights? "I was an awful husband," he admits. "Booze, women, long hours of work - I blame myself for what happened."

The final straw came on Christmas morning in 1999 when wife Sophie and his two young sons Daniel, 9, and Alex, 7, had to wait until dad - who'd been on the razzle - turned up to open their presents. Soon after, Sophie showed him the door and asked for divorce.

As the split became more acrimonious, so access to his kids got harder and harder. O'Connor went through the family courts and could see his boys only during supervised contact visits at family centres. "A more soul-destroying experience you couldn't imagine. One minute I was dad, the next I was treated as a pariah," he says.

So began a downward spiral which ended up on Waterloo Bridge with him clutching a picture of his boys and a farewell note, looking at the dark waters below. Then he had a bright idea: "Instead of jumping from bridges, maybe we dads could aspire to something higher. It was then that I came up with the idea of Fathers 4 Justice."

What exactly does Fathers 4 Justice really want?

"We want open family courts instead of the North Korean setup we have now," says O'Connor. And he wants a right in law for every parent to see their child and for mother and father to have shared residence in a 50:50 arrangement.

"But what about kids' rights?" I say. "What if they don't want to be moving from one house to the other? It can be an unsettling and stressful experience."

"It always make me laugh when judges say that; they usually have two homes. Kids can adapt to these situations. That's life," he says with a shrug of his shoulders.

Fathers 4 Justice was an immediate success, but it soon started spinning out of control. There were accusations of sexism and financial impropriety and then, in 2006, a tabloid newspaper carried a story that Fathers 4 Justice members were planning to kidnap the prime minister's five-year-old son Leo.

O'Connor announced that he was shutting up shop, saying he had created a "Frankenstein movement" and that he longed to return to a "normal life". But now he admits "that was just a tactical manoeuvre. I don't do normal".

He claims that the whole kidnap story was the work of Scotland Yard, Special Branch, M15 and even new Labour spin doctors who were out to get him and his movement. But, pressed on the subject, O'Connor admits the idea may have come from some "nutters on the fringe of the movement doing a bit of talk down the pub".

Ah, the nutter question. Ever since dads began to talk about their rights they have been portrayed by liberal commentators - especially women - as antiwomen and sexist and angry and rather, well, nutty.

It's a charge that O'Connor rejects outright but he admits that his group has attracted some unsavoury types: "We have strict rules about sexism, racism and misogyny - any of that and you're out of the door. We've had to expel about 30 people."

"But what about the charge that your movement is full of angry men?" I ask.

"Wouldn't you be angry if you weren't allowed to see your children?" asks O'Connor reasonably.

He is anxious not to be seen as antiwomen and talks about his "wonderful" former wife, with whom he has been reconciled, and of Nadine Taylor, the mother of his new child Archie, aged 18 months.

O'Connor is not antiwomen nor is he a nut. His style of agitprop activism comes from the left, but he has a view of society that we associate with the right. He complains about the state "becoming a surrogate parent, handing out benefits" which "undermine the roles of fathers".

He denies that he's in it for the glory but I don't think he'd be happy going back to being just a designer and a dad. He appears to have something of an addictive personality and is clearly hooked on the buzz of his crusade.

His autobiography, Fathers 4 Justice: the Inside Story, is about to be published - it's a moving and hilarious account of an angry dad. He has sold the movie rights and tells me that he's working on Fathers 4 Justice: the Musical. "It's a cross between Billy Elliot and Spamalot," he says with pride.

What I find puzzling is that if family courts really do discriminate against so many men, how come his own organisation has seen a fall in membership from 12,000 a few years ago to about 4,000 now?

"We've had to be more selective about membership to regain control," he says. "Remember, men are their own worst enemies. Having experienced the horrors of the court system, they tend to walk away. I can understand that."

I suspect the truth is that Fathers 4 Justice has peaked. There's a growing understanding of the importance of fathers and there are only so many pranks you can pull off before everyone gets tired. But O'Connor's not finished. "You wait to see what happens next," he says.

Australian feminist Germaine Greer has launched her second public attack on Princess Diana in a week, saying her legacy amounts to little more than endless adulation in the media.

Greer's latest outburst about the late princess comes just seven days after she branded Diana a "devious moron" during an address to the Edinburgh International Book Festival.

This time, the outspoken academic described Diana as a "desperate woman seeking applause" whose main aim was to be "queen of people's hearts" before she died in a car crash in Paris 10 years ago.

"Diana's legacy is no more than endless column inches of adulation and speculation," Greer wrote in The Sunday Times.

Greer said Diana became more "devious" and manipulative as she got older while displaying "disturbingly neurotic behaviour".

And the academic suggested Diana's behaviour could have even played a role in her own death.

"The saddest thought of all is that Diana's death may have resulted indirectly from another of her kack-handed manipulations; it is said that she only went to Paris with Dodi Fayed in order to make heart surgeon Hasnat Khan jealous," Greer wrote.

Greer also accused the late princess of "acting a lie" in presenting herself as a "guileless girl who fell in love with a chap who just happened to be heir to the English throne, only to have her innocent love spurned".

Instead, Greer said Diana had grown up with close ties to the royal family with her aristocratic father working as an equerry to the Queen and her grandmothers being members of the royal household.

Greer also noted that if Diana had studied history at school she would have realised that marrying the Prince of Wales was a "one-way ticket to misery".

Historically, Greer wrote, the "job" of being Princess of Wales had been a difficult one and filled by women who were used to their husbands cheating on them.

Greer said Prince Charles had managed to keep his marital affair with Camilla Parker Bowles quiet for many years, while Diana "sampled an extraordinary collection of men".

She also downplayed Diana's reputation as a global fashion icon, saying instead that the princess "dressed to the same demotic standard of elegance as TV anchorwomen do, plus the inevitable hat".

"It is precisely because she was basically anonymous that Diana's public could so easily identify with her; it should surprise no one that they then transferred their feelings to her and chanted as one that she identified with them," she said.

Friday, August 24, 2007

Children's services such as Plunket and Playcentre could reduce social problems such as child abuse by encouraging fathers to get involved, according to a new report on fathering.

Fathering Our City, a report for Waitakere City by Auckland University of Technology psychotherapist Warwick Pudney, says many services for children and families unconsciously exclude men through their "feminised" culture.

The report calls for both changing mainstream services to suit fathers as well as mothers, and developing specific services for fathers.

Waitakere City Council and other agencies, including Man Alive and Violence Free Waitakere, have organised a "Fathering Week" running from Monday until next Sunday - Fathers' Day - to start putting dads back on the agenda.

Events include a public meeting on supporting new fathers on Tuesday night, free training for dads to play games with their preschoolers on Thursday night, and a weekend expedition to the Waitakeres for dads and sons, with a night at a camp, on September 8-9.

Mr Pudney, who founded the Henderson counselling centre Man Alive in 1996, says that agency focused mainly on abuse and family crisis and did not provide any specific support to fathers.

The only specific "fathering service" in the city was Big Buddy, a spinoff from Man Alive which matches fatherless boys with volunteer male mentors. It has a policy of contacting the biological father whenever possible before providing a mentor, and sometimes that contact succeeds in relinking real fathers to their children.

"We kind of stumbled on this by accident," said Big Buddy director Richard Aston.

"With one father I just found myself getting angry with him. I said, 'Why the hell am I doing this, for God's sake, man!' And it worked!

"Of the people who come to us where we identify a father that could be involved with his kids, maybe 20 per cent get reconnected in some way."

Mr Pudney said other services that could help fathers tended to scare them away by being "unconsciously feminised".

"Things like Plunket and Playcentre have been serving women for a long time. There is a lack of consciousness about how it might be for a man going along there," he said.

"They say any man is welcome but don't notice what sort of magazines you have in the waiting room or the posters on the wall."

He says the feminist movement had to assert that men and women could do anything equally, but genetic science was now showing that the two genders were different.

"We have come from a culture where women, in claiming their independence, have tended to establish the notion that fathers are not necessary," he said.

His report cites local and overseas research showing that fathers help their sons to develop trust, and that fatherless boys are more likely to get into trouble, abuse drugs and alcohol, run away, and kill themselves. He says girls tend to approach the world through words, while boys tend to emphasise vision and physical action.

"Agencies like Plunket and Playcentre expect men to join in and behave like women," he said.

"I say, 'If you want to get men involved, don't try to chat to them. Call them in and ask them to do a job - this is the way men engage in things."

He suggests that antenatal classes should be renamed "new parenting classes", with guidance on the psychological effects of a baby and the effect on their relationship.

Albany psychologist Frank Hayes, who will speak at Tuesday night's meeting, said post-natal depression affected about 15 per cent of mothers - and about the same proportion of fathers.

"It just presents itself differently," he said. "The men get depressed and start drinking, start having affairs, start working more."

Mr Hayes runs monthly evenings for expectant and new fathers to deal with the psychological effects of new fatherhood.

When Dad's not there

* 80 per cent of boys referred to specialists for bad behaviour do not have fathers or have abusive fathers.

* 90 per cent of youth offenders do not have fathers.

* 90 per cent of homeless and runaway children come from fatherless homes.

* 63 per cent of youth suicides are in fatherless homes.

* Fatherless boys are 10 times more likely to abuse chemicals.

* Fatherless boys are 14 times more likely to rape.

Source: Warwick Pudney, Fathering Our City.

Why fathers matter

* Fathers give kids confidence in getting on with other males.

* Fathers provide half of a child's identity - "where I come from".

* Fathers encourage outward-looking action and adventure.

* Fathers often have more rigid boundaries that especially help boys to develop trust and security.

There is an old joke that says if you know a little about an issue, you probably have liberal perspective on the matter, but if you are well versed in the issue you probably have a more conservative perspective. Your article titled “Where are the men?” by Linda Diebel provides a great example to this joke. Having superficial knowledge of the issues, she does your normal knee jerk, misandry bashing of men on a very important social matter that has taken thousands of years to develop, only to be destroyed within the past 40 years.

The destruction of the family through the culture of divorce has also destroyed the morality of love – what the ancient Greeks called Agape compared to the increasing secularization theories of Eros, Philia or romantic love as advocated by modern self-actualization psychology. Marriage, based on these lower level love concepts rarely succeed and survive in a more civilized society. The self-actualization theories as advocated by Maslow and Rogers always lead to pathological egocentric narcissism; the opposite of what is required for marital success.

Next, women initiate almost 80% of divorces with the systemic and systematic outcome that fathers looses their children, house and income. In previous times this was called indentured servitude or even slavery. What reasonable or rational person would want to get into a contract in which it can be broken by the other party at any time for no reason and have to give up custody of their children as well as having their house, income and other property expropriated by the courts based on the moral superiority of women based on this positive legal concept called ‘the best interest of the children’? No rational or reasonable person would want to get married and have children in this pathological culture.

Finally, the term ‘deadbeat dad’ was used by the author in a rather derogatory and misandric way. Misandry is a concept of moral superiority based on gender profiling. Moral superiority through gender or racial or cultural profiling are forms of hate; and when legislated, is indicative of crimes against humanity. Gender based laws and initiatives are crimes contrary to the Treaty of Rome (U.N.), contrary to The Charter of Rights and Freedoms (Canada) and most importantly are contrary to the supremacy of the highest laws in our Charter, those which are natural moral rights.

If the author is truly seeking ‘root causes’ or causality, I would suggest further reading of Professor Sanford Braver’s longitudinal studies titled ‘Divorced Dads’. Sanford Braver tried to identify why men where not actively involved with their children and recognized the reasons were contrary to what he expected. While there was an actual 20% of divorced who were deadbeats, the other 80% where actually prevented from having an ongoing healthy relationship with their children by the custodial parent. In other words, the power of custody, systemically and systematically given to mothers, is the cause of fathers being ‘Deadbolted’ from being active in their children’s lives. This is contrary to the popular myths and stereotyping misconceptions as propagated by the author’s gynocentricism.

Another variant of the joke mentioned at the start of this letter is that the difference between a liberal and conservative is that conservatives are better read and therefore know more about reality. You often heard that Tragedy + Time = Comedy. Unfortunately, I find there is no humour in what is happening to our children when they grow up without one of their parents – especially when we still get root causes and causality wrong. After all, is there anything more important than the ability to develop our children’s potential? Previous generations called this love.

Thursday, August 23, 2007

An MP has called for compulsory lie detector tests for parents facingthe Family Law Court.

South Australian independent MP Ann Bressington says current familylaw is a divisive "cash cow" that harms those it aims to protect -children.

The federal government must intervene and rewrite the law, just as itis acting to protect indigenous children in the Northern Territory, MsBressington told AAP in Sydney, where she is attending a Human Rightsand Equal Opportunity Commission conference.

"We have to ask why the Attorney-General (Philip Ruddock) and thePrime Minister (John Howard) would be seen to support such adysfunctional (Family Law) Act when they can take the action they did in the Northern Territory to supposedly protect Aboriginal children,"she said.

A draft bill to introduce polygraph (lie detector) tests for individuals before Family Court proceedings would be introduced in the South Australian parliament in the next session, said Ms Bressington.

However, she said the use of polygraph tests needed to be implementedfederally.

"There is no recognition of perjury. A man or a woman can go into aFamily Law Court and lie about the conduct of their partner and it canbe proven to be false but there is no course of action that's taken,"Ms Bressington said.

"I believe the research and evidence to support the use ofpolygraphing, not for court but pre-court is very strong. It has a 98per cent accuracy .

"If we can save resources in the social services departments andthousands of hours spent by social workers investigating falseallegations ... that's a good thing."

Ms Bressington said the family law system was biased against men, butchildren suffered too.

"On top of the dysfunctional family law system we have a corruptedchild protection agency.," she said.

"We have children being coerced in interviews to support falseallegations.

"It's a feeding ground, it's a cash cow, people are literally stripedof any assets and use it (the court) against one another," she said.

Ms Bressington said her main focus was on drug and alcohol issues butthrough this she had experienced first hand the difficulties peoplefaced with family law.

In 2006 she introduced a bill calling for random drug testing of SAschool children.

She is the chief executive officer and founder of DrugBeat SouthAustralia, a treatment and rehabilitation centre.

Wednesday, August 22, 2007

I have known this young girl since birth and her mum was a friend . The whole sorrowful saga is heartwrenching to think about . As the case is before the Courts I will keep my thoughts on the why this happened to myself for the time being , however three words do come to mind , that is , historical child abuse .in solidarity -d4j

NZPA | Thursday, 23 August 2007After the family expressed its grief in court, name suppression was today lifted on the teenage girl who murdered her mother with a log splitter at her home in the Christchurch suburb of Papanui.

She is Bonny Nga Karohe Hohepa McIntyre, who was a 16-year-old student at the time of the murder in November last year.

A month ago, in the High Court in Christchurch she pleaded guilty to murdering her mother, Moria Jayne McIntyre.

McIntyre has received a life sentence for the murder, and the Crown did not seek to top it up with any non-parole term, so the session before Justice Graham Panckhurst today was held only to hear two victim impact statements read by family members.

They spoke directly to McIntyre at she sat in the dock sometimes showing flashes of defiance or tears and they kept pondering how she could have done what she did to the whole family, and voicing the loss they felt.

The court heard from Bonny McIntyre's sister Atlanta how family members were struggling to cope with the grief.

She repeatedly shouted or swore at her sister and said she loved her but would never forgive her.

When the statement had been read, Justice Panckhurst adjourned the sitting, telling the family: "I don't know that anything I say is going to help your situation. I simply feel for you all."

The girl originally appeared in the Youth Court where she had name suppression.

Justice Panckhurst today lifted the interim order that had continued when the case was transferred to the High Court.

Bob Dylan's song "The Times, They are a-Changin'" accurately described the turbulent 1960s in America. Today, countries like New Zealand and Germany are embracing their own times of change as they take from parents the God-given right to discipline and educate their children.

The New Zealand Parliament recently followed the lead of many European Union countries when it made spanking of children, or "smacking" as they call it, a criminal offense. One Parliament member, Pita Sharples, hailed the new law as an important step toward a "brave" new world. "Our support will not be popular with many people ... but we are asking New Zealand to be brave, to look at the possibility of a culture where we don't hit our children."

In Germany, as WorldNetDaily has reported, families who seek to homeschool their children are battling a government that claims it must prevent "parallel societies based on separate philosophical convictions." Parents of homeschooling families, many of whom are Christian, are being arrested and their children forcibly removed to public schools and foster homes because Germany claims its "obligation to provide for education" includes the exclusive right to produce "responsible citizens who participate in a democratic and pluralistic society" – a category that apparently excludes homeschoolers. The European Court of Human Rights gave its stamp of approval last year to this recent tyranny by the German government

Even some in America are trying to emulate these assaults on parental authority. In February of this year, California Assemblywoman Sally Lieber proposed a law that would make spanking of children younger than 3 years old a criminal offense punishable by a fine and/or jail time. Fortunately, the bill did not pass this time. And in many states there are increasing attempts to regulate and restrict the growing trend of homeschooling, which seems to pose a threat to proponents of government-monopolized education.

Our Western legal heritage has always recognized that the law of nature and nature's God has given parents – and not the state – the authority to control the education and discipline of their children. Any government usurpation of that family jurisdiction is an unwarranted abuse of power that runs contrary to historical, legal and biblical precepts.

In his "Commentaries on the Laws of England" (1765), Sir William Blackstone wrote that while parents have duties to their children with respect to "their maintenance, their protection, and their education," the duty to provide an education is by far "the greatest importance of any." Blackstone further explained that a parent would not confer any considerable benefit upon his child if, after bringing him into the world, "he entirely neglects his culture and education, and suffers him to grow up like a mere beast, to lead a life useless to others and shameful to himself."

The duty to provide an education for one's child springs directly from the biblical requirement to "[t]rain up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it." In Deuteronomy 6:7, we are taught the necessity of teaching God's law "diligently unto thy children," and in Ephesians 6:4 to "bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord."

If a parent chooses to educate his or her child outside of the home, Blackstone explains that the parental authority is then delegated "to the tutor or schoolmaster of his child; who is then in loco parentis [in the place of a parent]." Government schools, therefore, have no inherent right or duty to educate children, but operate solely on that authority delegated to them by the parents. They certainly have no authority, as the German schools claim, to squelch "separate philosophical convictions" cherished by parents who choose to exercise their authority to teach their children at home.

Regarding discipline, Blackstone noted that a parent "may lawfully correct his child, being under age, in a reasonable manner, for this is for the benefit of his education." Of course, child abuse and physical mistreatment are not considered to be "in a reasonable manner" and are rightfully declared to be unlawful. But reasonable discipline, including spanking, should never be prohibited by law.

The Bible is explicit that spanking is part of the authority of a parent. "Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child; but the rod of correction shall drive it far from him" (Proverbs 22:15). I can still remember, as a boy, my father's words to me before he gave me a good taste of his belt of correction for my disobedience. I now realize that it did "hurt him more than it hurt me" because he loved me. As the Scriptures instruct, "He that spareth his rod hateth his son: but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes" (Proverbs 13:24).

Blackstone spoke of a timeless truth when he said that an undisciplined child grows up to be an undisciplined adult, "like a mere beast, to lead a life useless to others and shameful to himself." If we allow the state to erode parental authority over discipline and education, we will reap, among other things, higher crime and even lower morality in the next generation. Abandoning God's unchanging law is a sure way to really see the times "a-changin'," but not for the better.

Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Men Shouldn't Be Overlooked as Victims of Partner ViolenceJoan Arehart-Treichel

In addressing intimate partner violence, the focus is usually on women who are physically battered by husbands or boyfriends. However, women sometimes hurt their partners as well.

Women are doing virtually everything these days that men are—working as doctors, lawyers, and rocket scientists; flying helicopters in combat; riding horses in the Kentucky Derby. And physically assaulting their spouses or partners.

In fact, when it comes to nonreciprocal violence between intimate partners, women are more often the perpetrators.

These findings on intimate partner violence come from a study conducted by scientists at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The lead investigator was Daniel Whitaker, Ph.D., a behavioral scientist and team leader at the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (which is part of the CDC). Results were published in the May Journal of Public Health.

In 2001, the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health attempted to amass data about the health of a nationally representative sample of 14,322 individuals between the ages of 18 and 28. The study also asked subjects to answer questions about romantic or sexual relationships in which they had engaged during the previous five years and whether those relationships had involved violence.

Of those subjects, 11,370 reported having had heterosexual relationships and also provided answers to the violence-related questions. So Whitaker and his colleagues decided to use the responses from these 11,370 subjects for a study into how much violence is experienced in intimate heterosexual partner relationships, who the instigators are, and whether physical harm accrues from the violence.

The 11,370 subjects, Whitaker and his colleagues found, reported on 18,761 relationships, of which 76 percent had been nonviolent and 24 percent violent. That almost a quarter of the subjects had engaged in violent relationships may seem high to some people, but "the rates we found are similar to those of other studies of late adolescents and young adults, a time period when interpersonal-violence rates are at their highest," Whitaker told Psychiatric News. Also, he added, "these rates demonstrate the magnitude of interpersonal violence as a health and social problem."

Furthermore, Whitaker discovered, of the 24 percent of relationships that had been violent, half had been reciprocal and half had not. Although more men than women (53 percent versus 49 percent) had experienced nonreciprocal violent relationships, more women than men (52 percent versus 47 percent) had taken part in ones involving reciprocal violence.

Regarding perpetration of violence, more women than men (25 percent versus 11 percent) were responsible. In fact, 71 percent of the instigators in nonreciprocal partner violence were women. This finding surprised Whitaker and his colleagues, they admitted in their study report.

As for physical injury due to intimate partner violence, it was more likely to occur when the violence was reciprocal than nonreciprocal. And while injury was more likely when violence was perpetrated by men, in relationships with reciprocal violence it was the men who were injured more often (25 percent of the time) than were women (20 percent of the time). "This is important as violence perpetrated by women is often seen as not serious," Whitaker and his group stressed.

Of the study's numerous findings, Whitaker said, "I think the most important is that a great deal of interpersonal violence is reciprocally perpetrated and that when it is reciprocally perpetrated, it is much more likely to result in injury than when perpetrated by only one partner."

The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, upon which this investigation was based, was funded by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development with co-funding from 17 other federal agencies.

An abstract of "Differences in Frequency of Violence and Reported Injury Between Relationships With Reciprocal and Nonreciprocal Intimate Partner Violence".

Jeremy Swanson wrote: Amy Houghton said.. "This is why I would not go to this. I was afraid it would get worse, and no one will listen. I probably will be attacked again, but I just do not believe this is the way to be heard. I work pro active with the law".The "law" has turned honest law abiding citizens into criminals in their own count! ry. Imagine if your own patriots in Boston on December 16, 1773 had taken that attitude? Where would the United States of America be today? Imagine if those who struck the first blow against tyranny has decided to stay home because it was too dangerous or "against the law?" Imagine if Martin Luther King had decided that peaceful direct action was not in keeping with the law at the time? Imagine if more Germans had got up and made themselves heard in Germany in the 1930's as the Nazis enslaved the country? They were the ones who chose to proactive with the law and it cost them the ruination of their country and the lives of millions. If the schoolchildren of Soweto had stayed home where would Mandela and South Africa be today? If F4J does not 'speak' for the struggle in this way then who will? I say that silence and inaction alludes to tacit acceptance of tyranny and slavery to a system that is so odious and to be one of the worst social disasters of this and this new century. What price our children? Let the words of history and those who made it speak to your position.

"Sometimes there may be a legal obligation to obey, but there will be no moral obligation to obey. When it comes to history it will be the people that break the law for freedom who will ! be remembered and honoured".British Politician Tony Benn

"We must become the change we want to see in the world." Mahatma Gandhi

"The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws". Ayn Rand

You can have power over people as long as you don't take everything away from them. But when you've robbed a man of everything, he's no longer in your power. Aleksander Solzhenitsyn

Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.John F Kennedy!

This is why I would not go to this. I was afraid it would get worse, and no one will listen. I probably will be attacked again, but I just do not believe this is the way to be heard. I work pro active with the law.Amy

Two Fathers 4 Justice activists today scaled the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC at approximately 1.30pm local time.

The activists scaled the memorial by dressing as tourists and the scalingthe memorial by hand before unveiling themselves in Captain America andBatman costumes as well as displaying a banner that read ŒFor the Fathers ofthe Nation: Fathers 4 Justice has arrived www.F4JUSA.com¹

Armed Capitol Police and the FBI quickly evacuated the memorial and arrestedseveral ground crew and tourists as scuffles on the ground ensued.

UnitedFuture deputy leader Judy Turner says the Family Court Matters Bill just introduced to Parliament fails to address any of the major problems of the Family Court.

"The inability of the Family Court to order paternity tests is an embarrassing oversight which should have been remedied in this Bill, but the Minister has chosen to continue ignoring the issue.

"I even offered my paternity testing member's bill on a plate to the Minister which would solve this anomaly and is based on a Law Commission recommendation - but he rejected it flat.

"The fact that only one in nine judgements allow for shared parenting is a major flaw in a Court that has decided it is best for children to relegate one parent to part-time visitor, despite research which tells us the opposite.

"Shared parenting should be the default position for a Court order, unless one parent is deemed unfit. But the Court has decided upon a default position that cuts one good parent - usually the father - out of a caring role for their children.

"Allowing the media further access to report this shabby Court will hopefully lead in the future to some substantive changes that are long overdue, but this Government Bill is mostly irrelevant," says Mrs Turner.

Creating a winner and a loser as the family Court system does, only encourages litigation, as the first parent to get a lawyer and head to Court is more likely to get sole custody, Mrs Turner points out.

"If shared parenting is the norm, it will take away the incentive for parents to drag their children through the Court. If the Minister wants to improve the Family Court system - that is what needs to happen."

Mrs Turner is also critical of the fact that the problems of legal aid, delays in process and abuse allegations, remain completely unaddressed by the Government.

"Our Family Court system needs an overhaul. The Minister needs to stop tinkering around the edges and review the system from the inside out," says Mrs Turner.

Thursday, August 16, 2007

A bill to officially introduce mediation in the Family Court has been introduced to Parliament.The Family Courts Matters Bill aims to increase the openness of the Family Court and improve its processes and procedures.

One of the key proposed changes is the introduction of family mediation on a permanent basis.

Minister of Courts Rick Barker says mediation is one way of dealing with less complex family disputes quickly and is less costly.

He says the bill also opens up the Family Court to the media and support people.

It will also extend counselling to other family members, such as grandparents.

Copyright (c) 2007 Radio New Zealand

NZPA | Friday, 17 August 2007The Family Court will be further opened to the media under a bill introduced to Parliament today.

Courts Minister Rick Barker said the bill would also change some processes and procedures.

"The Labour-led Government has already increased opennes for guardianship and other proceedings...and is now extending similar provisions to other Family Court proceedings," he said.

Monday, August 13, 2007

Fathers are now just as likely as mothers to win a custody battle for their children if they start the legal fight, latest figures show.Family Court statistics for 2005, released yesterday, show that most of what are now called "day-to-day care" parenting orders are still awarded to mothers.

But most orders also go to whoever applies for them, whether they are mums or dads. Mothers end up getting more orders in their favour only because they are more likely to apply for them.

The figures straddle the introduction of the new Care of Children Act in July 2005, which changed the terminology from custody to day-to-day care. Women lodged 68 per cent of the applications for custody of children in the last six months of the old law, and gained 69 per cent of the custody orders.

In the first six months of the new law, the proportion of applications for day-to-day care lodged by women dropped to 64 per cent, while the proportion lodged by men increased from 26 per cent to 30 per cent.

The other 5 per cent under the old regime, and 7 per cent under the new law, were cases where both parents or other relatives applied for the children.

The outcomes in the first six months of the new regime were more complicated:

* 56 per cent of day-to-day care orders were made to mothers only.

* 9 per cent went to fathers only.

* 11 per cent went to other relatives such as grandparents.

* 14 per cent were for shared care by both parents.

* 10 per cent were for shared care by one or both parents and/or other relatives.

Union of Fathers spokesman Jim Bagnall said he was not surprised that fathers were still less likely than mothers to apply for day-to-day care because of the way the child support system worked.

"Dads are working and dads have to pay child support, whether they gain a major share of the day-to-day care or not," he said.

"So what's the point of gaining day-to-day care, on even quite a strong basis, because we are still paying child support?"

He said only one party could get the domestic purposes benefit even if both parents had equal time with a child. In most cases that meant dad worked while mum collected benefit.

The Justice Ministry statistics also show a continued decline in protection orders being granted in domestic violence cases, despite police figures showing a rise in reported domestic violence crimes.

The report notes that this may be because a protection order, once granted, stays in force indefinitely unless someone applies to discharge it. Although no figures are given, this means that the number of protection orders in force may be stable or rising even though the number of new orders being granted is falling.

Care and protection

* Family Court statistics indicate that parenting orders tend to go to whoever applies for them - whether they are mothers or fathers.

* Since a law change in 2005, more fathers - and slightly fewer mothers - have been applying for custody of their children.

* In terms of child safety, just over 80 per cent of protection orders are granted by judges without notice to the respondent, who is the male in 90 per cent of cases.

Sunday, August 12, 2007

ONE third of separated fathers have little or no contact with their kids.

And almost a quarter of Australian children - more than a million kids - have a natural parent who does not live with them, the latest ABS family characteristics snapshot shows.

The 2006 census also shows one parent-families - which are overwhelmingly headed by women - now make up 15 per cent of all families.

The lack of contact is despite a determined effort on behalf of separated dads to play a more hands-on role.

According to the latest Child Support Agency figures, more than 21 per cent of parents applying for child support are now men looking after their kids as primary carer.

This is up from just 7.5 per cent a decade ago.

But experts have long argued part-time and supporting fathers need more help with their parenting role.

In a groundbreaking new program, YMCA Victoria, Relationships Australia, Mensline and the Life Is Foundation is launching DadsLink to help fathers.

DadsLink will bring fathers together to receive counselling, attend camps and just hang out.

"We know many fathers have an enormously important role to play in their children's lives," YMCA Victoria chief executive Peter Burns said.

"But we also know that many more fathers are struggling and wanting to learn more about how they can be a better dad, whatever their circumstances".

Relationships Australia spokesman Tony Gee said positive parenting after separation "brings a whole set of challenges". These include managing relationships with spouses and changing relationships with their children, he said.

Divorced dad Ross Clennett, 41, of East Bentleigh knows just how hard parenting can be after a relationship breakdown.

His children were just two and four when he separated from his former wife Michelle.

"It's a pretty difficult process particularly as the kids were so young," he said.

He sees his children Nicola, now 6, and Guy, 8, six nights a fortnight. And he has a six-week-old son, James, with new wife Michelle Tickle.

"I am a better dad now because I am more involved now than I was before - I was determined to make it work after the separation," he said.

"Because I don't have the kids all the time when I do I am very conscious of being with them and doing things with them."

- See www.victoria.ymca.org.au for more information on DadsLink, or to nominate someone for YMCA Community Father of the Year.See www.csa.gov.au for other programs for separated dads.

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(1997). Gender differences in partner violence in a birth cohort of 21 year Olds: bridging the gap between clinical and epidemiological approaches. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 65, 68-78. (Used CTS with a sample of 861 21 year Olds <436 men, 425 women> in New Zealand. Physical violence perpetration was reported during the previous 12 months by 37.2% of women and 21.8% of men, with severe violence perpetration by women at 18.6% and men at 5.7%.)

And another one: Fergusson, D. M., Horwood, L. J., & Ridder, E. M. (2005). Partner violence and mental health outcomes in a New Zealand birth cohort. Journal of Marriage and Family, 67, 1103-1119. (Examined extent of domestic violence experience and perpetration in a sample of 828 <437 women, 391 men> young adults who were 25 years old. Subjects were part of a long term longitudinal study and were administered the CTS2. Results reveal that "there were more men exposed to severe domestic violence than women" and that mild and moderate rates were similar for men and women. Overall, 39.4% of women and 30.9% of men reported perpetration scores of 3 or higher. Authors report that men and women reported similar rates of injury <3.9% for women vs. 3.3% for men>. In terms of initiation of partner assaults, 34% of women and 12% of men reported initiating physical assaults.)

Another example: Ehrensaft, M. K., Moffitt, T. E., & Caspi, A. (2004). Clinically abusive relationships in an unselected birth cohort: men's and women's participation and developmental antecedents. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 113 (2), 258-270. (Assessed 980 individuals, ages 24-26, who were participants in longitudinal study in New Zealand. Subjects were examined with the CTS, the Partner Conflict Calendar, PCC, a measure of the consequences of abuse and a variety of personality and psychopathology scales. Findings reveal that 9% of the total sample, with an equal number of men and women, were victims of clinical abuse in their relationships with partners.)

A further example: Jackson, S. M., Cram, F. & Seymour, F. W. (2000). Violence and sexual coercion in high school students' dating relationships. Journal of Family Violence, 15, 23-36. (In a New Zealand sample of senior high school students <200 women, 173 men> 21% of women and 19% of men reported having been physically hurt by their heterosexual dating partner.)

And yet another study: Lewis, A. & Sarantakos, S. (2001). Domestic Violence and the male victim. Nuance, #3. (Based on interviews with 48 men in Australia and New Zealand, authors present findings that domestic violence by women toward men exists, that the refusal to examine the prevalence of this abuse is a "disempowerment" of men and that official policy should be changed to provide help for abused men.).

Thursday, August 9, 2007

The latest UNICEF report, An Overview of Child Well-Being in Rich Countries, highlights some unpalatable facts about New Zealand children and families. In particular, it reveals a very disturbing truth; across the 24 nations surveyed, New Zealand's children are the second most likely to die before the age of 19.

The report also shows that New Zealand is generally ranked 16th out of 24 nations for outcomes such as overall material well-being for children. This is not that surprising given New Zealand's economy is not as wealthy as other OCED countries, such as the USA and many western European states. What we should not expect, however, is that our children are most at risk for physical harm compared to other OECD nations.

The report also makes a striking connection; children are most likely to be at risk of injury, death or abuse under certain conditions, including single parenthood, poverty, low maternal wage at birth, and weak family ties. These factors are all closely related to each other, and they remind us that parents who raise children alone need our attention and support. In addition, they should remind us of the importance of strong families in promoting the well-being of our children.

Several child advocates have used this latest report to urge for greater intervention from the government. Certainly, government is important; it sets the legal and in some sense the moral environment in which people live. But, ultimately, it is parents who are responsible for the health and safety of their children. If we want to reverse the shocking statistics featured in the report, we need to begin, not with government and law, but with parents, families and communities.

8. Youths who communicate, do activities and have close relationships with their parents are less likely to engage in violence.

9. Teens who frequently have dinner with their families are at a lower risk for substance use.

10. Teens whose parents are home with them after school and in the evening are less likely to experience emotional distress.

Heritage In Focus: August Top Ten Top Ten Archives

July 2007Early Childhood OutcomesJune 2007 The Father Factor

May 2007Teen Sexual Behavior

April 2007Staying HealthyMarch 2007Protecting the Family

February 2007To Wed or Cohabit?

January 2007Poverty and Families

December 2006 Well-Being

November 2006Why We're Thankful for Family

October 2006Civic Engagement September 2006 Back to School

August 2006 A Closer Look at Welfare

July 2006 Parenting Matters

Family Research Experts

Pat FaganWilliam H. G. FitzGerald Research Fellow in Family and Cultural Issues

Christine KimPolicy AnalystDomestic Policy Studies

Jennifer Marshall DirectorDomestic Policy Studies

For Interviews call Media Relations at (202) 675-1761 The Heritage Foundation's familyfacts.org catalogs social science findings on the family, society and religion gleaned from peer-reviewed journals, books and government surveys. Serving policymakers, journalists, scholars and the general public, familyfacts.org makes social science research easily accessible to the non-specialist.

Tuesday, August 7, 2007

Common Sense diesThe author and source of what follows are unknown, but yourreaders will appreciate it; we mourn the passing of a beloved old friend,Common Sense. No one Knows how old he wasbecause his birth records were lost in bureaucratic red tape.

“He will be remembered as having cultivated such valuable lessons asknowing when to come out of the rain, why the early bird gets theworm, life isn’t always fair, and maybe it was my fault.

Common sense lived by sound financial polices (don’t spend morethan you earn), and reliable parenting strategies (adults notchildren are in charge). His health began to deteriorate when well intentioned regulations were set in place.

Common sense lost ground when parents attacked teachers for doing the job they failed to do in disciplining their unruly children. It declined even further when schools were required to get parental consent to administer paracetamol or a sticky plaster to a student but could not inform the parents when a student wanted tohave an abortion.

“Common sense lost the will to live as the Ten Commandmentsbecame contraband and criminals received better treatment than theirvictims.

Common Sense took a beating when you couldn’t defendyourself from a burglar and the burglar could sue for assault.

“Common Sense was preceded in death by his parents, Truth and Trust; his wife, Discretion; his Daughter, Responsibility; and his son,Reason. He is survived by brothers, I Know my rights, Someone else is toBlame and I’m a Victim.”

Sunday, August 5, 2007

YOU ARE WELCOME TO COME AND STAY WITH ME AT ANY TIME, BUT YOU MUST REMEMBER THAT I AM THE PARENT AND YOU ARE THE CHILD

SO WITH THIS UNDERSTANDING, THERE COMES RULES

AS THE PARENT, IT IS MY RESPONSIBILITY TO TEACH YOU ALL THE WISDOM I HAVE LEARNED AND SHOW YOU THE UNCONDITIONAL LOVE I HAVE FOR YOU

AS THE CHILD, IT IS YOUR RESPONSIBLITY TO RESPECT ME, AND LISTEN AND LEARN THE LESSONS I AM TEACHING YOU

I KNOW THAT IT APPEARS THAT I AM A HARD TASK MASTER, HOWEVER , I COME FROM THE SCHOOL OF HARD KNOCKS, AND BECAUSE OF THIS I DO NOT WANT YOU TO HAVE TO GO THROUGH WHAT I HAD TO

THE LESSONS I SHARE WITH YOU ARE TO HELP YOU IN THE FUTURE, NOT HINDER YOU

MANY OF YOU DO NOT REALLY UNDERSTAND LOVE AS IT SHOULD BE. BELIEVE ME WHEN I TELL YOU, IT IS NOT SOMETHING THAT IS BOUGHT OR JUST SAID BY SPEAKING THE WORD LOVE, IT IS SOMETHING MUCH GREATER AND COMES FROM WITHIN. IT IS NOT ON THE OUTSIDE.

THINGS ON THE OUTSIDE, ARE VISUAL ONLY, THEY WILL NOT MAKE YOU HAPPY. YOU HAVE TO FIND AND LOVE YOURSELF INSIDE BEFORE YOU CAN BE HAPPY ON THE OUTSIDE , OR EVEN MAKE SOMEONE ELSE HAPPY

FOR MY CHILDREN WHO HAVE FOUND THIS ALREADY I AM THANK FULL. FOR MY CHILDREN WHO ARE STILL CONFUSSED AND SEARCHING, I AM HERE WAITING TO TEACH YOU. FOR MY CHILDREN WHO ARE STILL YOUNG, I AWAIT THE DAY THAT I CAN TEACH YOU

REMEMBER, I AM YOUR DAD FOREVER, AND WILL BE HERE FOR YOU, ALL IT TAKES IS A COMMITTMENT ON YOUR BEHALF AND THE DESIRE TO RECEIVE MY LOVE

And, who was that silly person that said New Zealand is the land of milk and honey ?

By LOIS WATSON - Sunday Star Times | Sunday, 5 August 2007

FILL 'ER UP: New Zealand's doctors wrote more than 1 million prescriptions for anti-depressants last year.

School children are increasingly being prescribed anti-depressants and other mind-altering drugs, despite official warnings about their safety.

Under 18-year-olds were given more than 72,000 prescriptions for drugs for mental health problems last year, figures from the government drug-buying agency Pharmac show.

Yet MedSafe warned doctors three years ago about the risks of prescribing anti-depressants to young people and the importance of monitoring them closely.

Figures obtained by the Sunday Star-Times show the number of prescriptions for children aged six to 18 who are on anti-depressants - including the selective seratonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) which have been linked to an increased risk of suicidal thoughts and behaviour - now stands at 15,245 - up from just over 11,000 five years ago.

And the number of children taking behaviour-altering drugs Ritalin and Rubifen for conditions such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) also continues to rise, up from 53,219 prescriptions in 2003 to 55,301 last year.

Nationally the number of prescriptions for anti-depressants topped the million mark for the first time - up from 697,574 in the year ended June 2001 to 1,004,471 in the year to June 2006.

The increased use of anti-depressants among children comes despite the publication of research showing that children given anti-depressants run a higher risk of self-harm and are more likely to attempt suicide.

Pharmac medical director Peter Moodie said he suspected doctors were heeding the warnings about the use of anti-depressants in young people and that most scripts for the drugs were now written by psychiatrists.

Warnings about the dangers associated with SSRIs had coincided with greater public awareness of depression, which could explain why levels remained high, he said. Pharmac was continuing to monitor the situation.

"The reality is that there are sometimes children or young people who do need anti-depressants," Moodie said.

Dr Allen Fraser, from the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists, said the increased availability and effectiveness of child psychiatric services in New Zealand was undoubtedly a factor in the continued rise in the use of anti-depressants among young people.

"There is a need to treat people with depression, whether adolescents or adults, in the best way possible. For some people, the best way of treating them is with medication," Fraser said.

A child psychiatrist, when dealing with a new patient, looked at all treatment options before going down the path of medication, he said.

"Medication has never been the first-line of treatment by child psychiatrists, but it's never been the last line either."

Another Maori baby has died of abuse. Three year old Nia Glassie, the little girl who was tortured by family, finally lost her battle.

Meanwhile the 12-week-old Rotorua baby, who was rushed to Starship Hospital last weekend with suspicious head injuries, remains in hospital. The little boy’s grandfather is reported to be a senior member of the Black Power gang.

The unspeakable question on everyone’s mind is whether child abuse is a Maori problem. Given that Maori children are six times more likely to be abused than non-Maori, and that child abusers are eight times more likely to Maori than non-Maori, the facts tell us that child abuse in New Zealand is predominantly a Maori problem.

The Prime Minister and her politically correct government refuse to accept those facts. They like to blame everyone else, including neighbours. In fact, the only people who appear not to be blamed for child abuse are the abusers, with Labour having put in place a sentencing regime that sees child abusers treated more leniently that those who abuse animals.

To deflect criticism away from their failure to reduce child abuse, the government has hastily launched a controversial new programme to question all sick women in hospital about their personal relationships and sex life: Have you ever felt controlled or always criticised? Has anybody hurt or threatened you? Have you been asked to do anything sexual that you didn't want to do?

Quite who will collect this information, who will see it, or what it will used for, has not been spelt out. Nor do we know whether this questioning represents the blatant breach of privacy laws that it certainly appears to do on the surface.

Under this $11 million feminist strategy, sick women will be asked questions that are designed to set the machinery of the state against men even though the research around domestic violence and child abuse is unequivocal: women are perpetrators, as well as men.

This week’s NZCPR guest commentator, Bev Adair, runs a communications and networking business and is passionate about her role of advocating for children and young people. Bev is a Maori woman who was brutally abused as a child. She is angry that Maori leaders have not done more to stop the abuse of Maori children, and she has bravely agreed to share her story:

“From my earliest years I lived with violence. I remember knives, blood on walls, being beaten, being locked up in cupboards, being molested by my Dad, being used by my mother's men friends - she put me on show for them. When I was nine, my Dad was jailed for molestation. I was taken to the Papakura police station in a car, put in a room, and given away to foster parents. I had little contact with my mother after that. I visited my father in jail and never saw him again. Abuse by foster dads followed. I lived in seventeen different foster homes and attended seventeen schools”. (To read Bev’s story click the sidebar link>>>)

Bev believes that not enough has been done to address the root causes of child abuse and that leadership by Maori - and by the government – is sadly lacking. If it was up to Bev, she would cut benefits to get parents and children out of the welfare trap freeing them up to get on with making something of their lives instead of being beholden to their political and tribal masters.

Last year, in response to the death of the Kahui twins, Alan Duff wrote a guest article for the NZCPR outlining why Maori abuse their children. He believes that a lack of education is a central problem: “You don’t see Maoris with university degrees beating up anyone”.

He states: “There is a disturbing anger common to far too many Maori that needs to be deeply investigated, like some permanently infected wound. Maoris dominate in gang numbers and prison inmate numbers. We have the highest number of assaults and almost exclusively own the child murder statistics. This attitude, this barbaric outlook on life will continue for the next thousand, ten thousand years if we don’t analyse it properly, if we don’t hold ourselves, our very societal model up to scrutiny”.

He describes Maori culture as being based on a “Stone Age” societal model which does not work in a modern world: “To continue with the collective, whanau, hapu, iwi societal model is a fatal mistake. A fatal mistake. For in not developing individuality we continue down the declining slope of anonymity in a collective. Of no-one willing to make decisions – especially unpopular decisions – for fear of standing out from the crowd, going against the collective will”.

And that is the core problem. Maori leadership have heralded tribalism as a cultural renaissance, when in fact it has been used to perpetrate the myth of cultural oppression and to foster separatism. In this day and age tribalism is little more than a celebration of class privilege and vehicle to unlock the riches available through the Waitangi Treaty settlement process. As a result of persisting with this outdated societal model, social dysfunction has been allowed to flourish in far too many Maori communities.

Again, as Alan Duff says: “The quality of debate in this country on Maori issues is poor, cowardly, non-analytical, and none of it serves the Maori people well. Like social welfare, which many of us have warned about for years, every government benefit takes another breath of the recipient’s self-respect away. Until they choke on self-hatred and maim and kill themselves and others”. (To read Alan’s article click here>>>)

Wise Maori know that welfare is destroying their people. They know that the Domestic Purposes Benefit in particular, has been hugely damaging to Maoridom. I have been on marae after marae where the notion of abolishing the DPB and replacing it with a system that encourages work, independence and personal responsibility, finds overwhelming support.

They know that where once Maori families were once strong, the DPB has made them dangerously weak and fragmented. They know that where Maori men were once committed fathers, husbands and providers, the DPB has caused them to be rejected and cast adrift. They know that their boys - instead having a father to look up to, to teach respect for women, and to demonstrate unconditional love – are all too often turning to gangs in their search for a father figure.

According to government records, back in 1926 when the statistics on marriage were first collected, the marriage rate for Maori was 69 percent and for non-Maori, 62 percent. Over the next 50 years marriage rates increased until by 1971, the marriage rate for Maori was 73 percent and for non-Maori, 77 percent.

But the introduction of the Domestic Purposes Benefit in the mid seventies changed all that, especially for Maori. By 1981 the marriage rate for Maori had slipped to 62 percent, by 1991 it had fallen to 50 percent, and by 2001 to 46 percent. In comparison, by 2001 the non-Maori marriage rate had gradually declined to 70 percent.

It is this collapse of marriage and a dramatic rise in the DPB that is at the heart of the Maori child abuse crisis. Maori women are now heavily over-represented on the DPB, making up 41 percent of all women on that benefit. But the trend for teenage parents is even more worrying. Maori teenagers make up 55 percent of all teenage parents on the DPB, and unless this trend is turned around, the Maori child abuse crisis will get worse.

There are solutions. Other countries have faced similar problems and have replaced sole parent benefits with support systems based on getting parents into the workforce. As a result, the incidence of child abuse has fallen, long term unemployment has reduced, school drop out rates have declined and marriage has become more popular. In fact, there is no downside except the predictable political one.

Maori leaders who are genuine about wanting to turn around the child abuse crisis should band together and call for the replacement of the DPB. They should not accept anything less.

Governments like Labour depend on the support of people on welfare - the more people who are dependent on the state the better they like it. That is why their welfare reforms are only ever half hearted.

Maori leaders will have a fight on their hands to get the DPB replaced. But if they are successful, they will be responsible for saving the next generation of children from a fate that under our current system simply doesn’t bear thinking about.

Poll: The poll this week asks whether you think all women entering a New Zealand public hospital should be questioned about whether they have been subjected to abuse.To vote click here>>> [Comments received during the week on the column and the poll will be posted here>>>]

Last week's poll asked: Do you favour the introduction of policies to encourage marriage in New Zealand? Result: 94% said Yes and 6% said No. You can read the hundreds of comments that were submitted by clicking here>>>.

Housekeeping: Please feel free to forward this newsletter on to others who you think would be interested. A printer-friendly version is on the www.nzcpr.com website.

Don't forget that we are always keen to consider publication of opinion pieces for the website Soapbox Series - why not visit the page and send in your submission.

To contact Muriel about this week’s column please click here>>>.

NZCPR Weekly is a free weekly newsletter by Dr Muriel Newman of the New Zealand Centre for Political Research, a web-based forum at www.nzcpr.com for the lively and dynamic exchange of political ideas. You can reach Muriel by phone on 09-434-3836, 021-800-111 or by post at PO Box 984 Whangarei.

If you have a change of address, please note your old address and your new one and click here>>>. To unsubscribe, please click here>>> and send. (Please note - if you get back a message saying the address is not on the mailing list, it means you are subscribed under a different address and you will need to submit that one)

Saturday, August 4, 2007

On Sunday August 05/07, Fathers4Justice Canada, Vancouver BC "team members" will be participating in one of Canada's most colourful and popular parades, the Vancouver Pride Parade.

This will be the second year we have participated in this parade and again another opportunity to put forward our message of equality to a large number of people in a non confrontational manner with no arrests. Last year over 300,000 received our message in said event. This year over 400,000 people are expected to attend. The parade is currently at its maximum in the way of entries allowed and expected to be once more a success.

Fathers4Justice members will be suiting up at 7:30 am, going for breakfast in limo and costumes before making their way into downtown Vancouver to be assembled by 10:30 am in the marshaling area. The Parade officially begins at 12:00 noon for all those wishing to attend.

A float decorating party/barbecue is being held Saturday,August 04/07 at the Bat cave in Vancouver BC all day.

Confirmed in this years line up of F4J Superheroes who will be attending the parade are:

Wednesday, August 1, 2007

Press Release: Family First MEDIA RELEASE 31 JULY 2007 Child Abusers Are Also Women

Family First says that the questioning of women entering New Zealand public hospitals about family violence is a step in the right direction towards tackling child abuse - but only a very very small step.

"This procedure will tackle 1% of the problem," says Bob McCoskrie, National Director of Family First NZ. "However, it ignores a fundamental issue that women, including mothers, are also abusing children."

Recent cases include:* a Napier woman admitted hitting her young children on the hands and arms with a hammer, belt with metal studs, punched children in head (April 2007)* mother, 32, and stepfather, 27, convicted of beating 3 year old Ngatikaura Ngati (Otara) to death (June 2007)* Porirua mum and step-father charged with mistreating 3 children including 5 year old admitted to Wellington Hospital with serious head injuries (June 2007)* 28-year-old woman charged with murdering a newborn baby found dead in the backyard of a Te Mome Road property in Alicetown (June 2007)* Mum-of-two found at P Lab. Charged with failing to provide necessaries of life and allowing home to be used for manufacturing P (June 2007)

"The approach also ignores research by the Christchurch School of Medicine showing that men and women are equally to blame in dishing out domestic violence," says Mr McCoskrie.

Family First reiterates that honesty and reality is needed in reaching solutions on child abuse.

It repeats its call for a 5-point Action Plan to be implemented immediately, which takes the responsibility out of the hands of politicians, and puts it firmly in the hands of local communities and organisations who are working with at-risk families on a daily basis.

The 5-Point Action Plan is:

1. establishing a non-political Commission of Inquiry comprising community leaders who are already working with at-risk families - to identify effective and achievable solutions to child abuse, and examining specifically the role of drug and alcohol abuse, family structure and breakdown, race-based issues, and poverty and stress.

2. immediate increase of support and resourcing of grass-root community organisations who are working with at-risk families and those attempting to stop abuse in the first place - for example HIPPY Foundation, Early Start, Family Help Trust and other early childhood home-based programmes.

3. increased investment and availability of parenting organisations such as Parents Inc, Triple P and other community based positive parenting programmes.

4. media-based anti-'child abuse' campaign, in the same way road safety 'shock' campaigns are run, raising the awareness of and encouraging 'positive' parenting and identifying what is abuse.

5. sentencing for those who abuse and kill our children to be substantially toughened to provide both a deterrent and a clear message of our community's disgust with the actions of people who abuse children.